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What Is Standardized Testing

The document discusses standardized testing. It defines standardized tests as assessments with consistent format, questions, instructions, and timing for all students. It notes that standardized tests measure mastery of curriculum or teaching quality. The document then discusses the history of standardized testing and provides pros and cons of such assessments, such as their ability to evaluate students and curriculum but also potential unfairness. It concludes standardized tests can identify weaknesses when not relied on exclusively for evaluation.

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Le Di Chang
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168 views

What Is Standardized Testing

The document discusses standardized testing. It defines standardized tests as assessments with consistent format, questions, instructions, and timing for all students. It notes that standardized tests measure mastery of curriculum or teaching quality. The document then discusses the history of standardized testing and provides pros and cons of such assessments, such as their ability to evaluate students and curriculum but also potential unfairness. It concludes standardized tests can identify weaknesses when not relied on exclusively for evaluation.

Uploaded by

Le Di Chang
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Written assignment unit 7

Master of Education
University of the People

EDUC 5220: Curriculum design and instructional decision making

Dr. Kimberly Doerflein

May 25, 2021


What is Standardized Testing?
 
 Standardized Testing supposes certain objectives, goals, criteria which are held within one form

of test. It can measure pupils' mastery of curriculum or teachers’ proficiency. Standardized Test

consists of four essential aspects.

1- Format; usually multiple-choice, true\false or fill in the blank, the student must have the same

format.

2- Question; students should have the same questions.

3- Instruction; should be the same for all students.

4- Time distribution; the time needed to complete the test is the same for all.

Students seem to have these tests at the end of each unit or semester (that what is called primary

standardized test). Once students are planning to attend college, they must take special

standardized test measures students’ readiness for college.

Talking about early history for a standardized test, it has known in the 7th century in China " The

tests, built upon a rigid “eight-legged essay” format, tested the applicants’ rote-learned

knowledge of centralized Prussian school system philosophy, and were in widespread use until

1898. In the Western world,"( ProCon.org, 2020). After that two reformers of Boston schools,

Horace Mann and Samuel Howe concentrated their efforts to model standardized test for a

Prussian school system, these tests contain two phases, first one is to judge and compare the

output of each school, the second phase is to have a clear vision about teaching quality. Later

on, many schools’ systems adopted Boston's program.

Now let us talk about some pros and cons of standardized test, one advantage could be

considered a disadvantage…

1-A) Standardized tests deliver a thematic measurement of education and mention an


evaluative system for improvement

Making these tests continuously reflect an understanding of each student and help teachers and

administrators determine the effectiveness of the methods used and existing competencies.” At

their core, standardized exams are designed to be objective measures. They assess students based

on a similar set of questions, are given under nearly identical testing conditions and are graded

by a machine or blind reviewer. They are intended to provide an accurate, unfiltered measure of

what a student knows.”(churchil.2015).

1-B) Standardized tests might be unfair in some conditions, however, these tests give an

immediate evaluation and completely ignore student's progress, Standardized tests easily being

affected by many factors, stress, illness, or war. it measures students' preparation for the test, not

their knowledge.

2-A) Standardized tests are good resources for teachers' evaluation

students' grades and Standardized tests are good resources for teacher evaluation, teacher can

determine the students' level and evaluate everything related to books, classrooms, curricula, and

administration and then compare these results with the required results. Timothy Hilton stated

“No self-respecting teacher would use a single student grade on a single assignment as a final

grade for the entirety of a course" (blogs.edweek.org, 2018).

2-B) it is unfair to evaluate teachers according to students' grade in any kind of test, teachers

suffer and struggle hard in delivering knowledge to all students, they do their best in all ways and

possible approaches they know, evaluating them should not be within a certain time or under a

specific test, rather than this process must be during the year taking in consideration all the effort

made. Adopting this process as one of the evaluation metrics could make some teachers assist

students in their tests to avoid teachers getting a low rank.


Where I work, we use standardized tests as the main tool in knowing students’ ability, each two

months standardized tests are held for two weeks for all topics, that means students have two or

three standardized tests during each semester, and to be fair enough 50% of final grade depend

on the sum of all test grades divided by the number of tests, and the other 50% is for homework,

participation, and projects.

To conclude, using Standardized tests is a good idea to discover weaknesses and strengths in any

curriculum, it helps students test their knowledge and get feedback about which topics they need

to focus on. While Standardized tests are considered as objective approaches to grading/ assess

the academic achievement of students, teachers or administrators can not rely on this kind of test

in getting accurate data, they must take into their consideration all fixed and variable factors that

may affect any member in the evaluation process.


Reference 

Burrows. B, (2020), What is a Standardized Test? https://www.studyusa.com/en/a/1284/what-is-


a-standardized-test

Churchil ,A, ( 2015), "Bless the Tests: Three Reasons for Standardized Testing,", Retrieved May
,24,2021, from https://fordhaminstitute.org/national/commentary/bless-tests-three-reasons-
standardized-testing

Ferlazzo. L.(Aug,2018), Response: The Role of Student Test Scores in Teacher Evaluations,"
blogs.edweek.org , Retrieved (May,24,2021) from https://www.edweek.org/education/opinion-
response-the-role-of-student-test-scores-in-teacher-evaluations/2018/08

ProCon.org. 2020, Do Standardized Test Improve Education in America?


https://standardizedtests.procon.org/

The Glossary of Education .(n;d), STANDARDIZED TEST,


https://www.edglossary.org/standardized-test/

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